Lyman 452460 SWC & Kuhnhausen

[prs]

One of the bullet designs my two 1911 pistols "likes" best. If you have a copy of THE COLT 45 AUTOMATIC A Shop Manuel Volume 1, then refer to figure 86 on page 63 items 3 and 4. The SWC used to demonstrate an aspect of head spacing appears to be the Lyman -460. The bullet is seated out quite a bit further than I have been seating. Is it common or best practice to seat them out to "kiss" or almost kiss the chamber heading seat? Similar to seating rifle bullets to touch the rifling when chambered. I have been seating with just a tiny bit of forward drive band exposed ahead of my crinp. I am getting ready to cast this bullet design today.

prs

[fecmech]

For my Wad Gun I seat -460 so that the case head is even with the end of the barrel hood when dropped in.

[prs]

Yep, me too; but in that reference I cited the wad cutter is seated out more than I have ever tried. I may have to experiment some. Casting session went well, yield about 40# of 452465. Got all that put away, then went to the range with 105 rounds with H&G 68. Life is good.

prs

[243winxb]

Seating to the rifling requires a fine adjustment of the COL so the action always closes. Measuring to the nose of the bullet has not worked for me. A change in alloy makes bullets longer or shorter. So i meassure to the shoulder. Not all chambers will work with this method, if cut to long. http://i338.photobucket.com/albums/n420/joe1944usa/CastBullets_20090207_005.jpg http://i338.photobucket.com/albums/n420/joe1944usa/45acp947inch_001.jpg http://i338.photobucket.com/albums/n420/joe1944usa/45seatingpossibilitiesxn.jpg

[prs]

243winxb: Thanks. I used the two barrels and a Wilson guage to see what I could gain. Not very much over the Lyman spec for over all length and no where near that shown in the cited reference. But I did gain some margin of lead over the tapered case mouth and I did verify that I am not distorting the bullets.

I do not have a mould for the 130 Seaco, but the others you show work very well for me. Your 460 has a slightly different transition to metplat than does my recent Lyman rendition.

prs

[Old Caster]

It depends on the individual gun as to where the bullet must or should be seated. In my Les Baer wad gun if there is more than about .030 setting in front of the case, it will alibi but others can be seated like shown in the picture. When you have a lot of old many times fired brass, the brass will vary a lot in length and will make it appear that your seating depth is varying. I seat the bullet very close to even with the front of the case in the longest cases I have.

[dale2242]

I seat 452460s in my 1911 so the front driving band extends 1/16" beyond the end of the case.
It has fed reliably in all 45s I have tried it in...dale

[Echo]

Note that the chamber is always longer than the case*, so to ensure no 'end-play', the boolit should be seated out to touch, or even engrave (depending on the hardness of the boolit) on the rifling origin.

*Use your depth mike - Lyman says the max case length is .898 - the chamber will be several thousandths deeper than that.

[prs]

Echo and dale, for my Ruger SR1911 pistols, it works out pretty close to Old Caster's description for his shoot'n arn; probably the only resembelence mine have to a high end product. lol. I set the boolits out to where with firm pressure pushing the cartridge into the chamber, the case heads were flush with the hood. No where near a quarter or even sixteenth of an inch.

The little bit of set out I could get would stop complete closure of the action if I used my hand to slowly close, but a session of 100 rounds saw no failures to feed. These are sized to .452". I think I will return to Lyman's COL which is practically flush.

prs